Date of Birth: 20.March 1970

Hometown: Gelsenkirchen / Germany

Who are your sponsors?

My Sponsors are Selma Star, OBG, NICOLAI and Banzai.

Do you have a girlfriend?

Yes, here name is Britta and she lives in my town. If it possible she comes to the races.

When did you start to race Mountainbikes?

I started to race Mountainbikes in 1993. My fist race was in Eifa, I bent my rear wheel , my handlebars and became 3rd. After his I went to a bigger race but I only went ther on

Sunday because I was used to go to the races on Sunday from BMX. This was not to good because of this I missed the Saturday practise and I did only one run. I crashed on this one and someone told me that I can not race with my Skateboard helmet so I dicided not to race. The next race I went to was the World championships in Metabiefe / France. I liked the track and it was everything cool. But I had to work on my rear brake because it did not work after practice. I went to Turro because they gave me the bike and told them that I need help with my Magura. They told me to come back the other day because they had finished there work for the day. When I got to the course for the qualification run I met a friend who was wondering that I was still in the finish area. He exlanend to me that I have to go to the start because they run the qualification from the big numbers down to the small ones. So I went up at the top with no rear brake and this made the things not easier. I remember I was riding behind Francois Gachet and after 500m there was the only dry part of the course were I went to fast could not brake and went down over a small table jump. I hit my Bell Moto 5 helmet really hard and broke my Acerbis chestprotection, I had no knee protction because they were all wet from the day before. I ended up with not making it to the final and going home drinking a 32-pack beer while my friend was driving the car. From there on I started to race Mountainbikes.

What did you do before?

I was riding BMX. I did a lot of races but I rode Halfpipe, Dirt and Street as well. In dirt I was winning every contest in Germany, except for one were I got second because of a crash were I broke my thumb. I started to race BMX in 1984. I raced against Bas de Bever, Eric,Carter, Dave Cullinan, Franck Roman, Mike King and some others who are now into mountainbikes. But I never really trained, so I lost a lot of races at the last Straigtaways. I had good starts but I lost because of my fitness. Jumping was what I liked and I did a lot of tricks back in 1990 like 360 lockback, Can can x-up, no foot into no foot can-can into no foot,etc. But in 1993I was burned out because of all the officials that did not understand why we are riding.

What was you biggest succees so far?

In BMX: 2.place at the German Championships, 3rd at the European Championships, 6th at the Worlds and 3rd at the race of Champions at the ABA Grandnational/ USA. I Mountainbike: 1.Place Eurobike Sprint, 9th place Dual World Cup, 10. place European Championship Downhill

What will you do in the winter?

Sit at home lift weights and try to make my ideas to work. Descibe what it is like to race Downhill or Dual!? Downhill is for me like surfing. I try to find the perfect run it is not the fastest but it must give me the feeling that I did everything right. I hate the feeling if you go down a cours and in every berm you think this could go much fastet. I like to ride smooth I care a lot about my bike and that is mabe one reaseon why I am not winning races right now. But I want to ride the track that I feel good. For Dual it is a wonderful feeling to be ahead of someone and you feel that he wants to pass you but you are going to fast for him. Descibe a normal day in your life?! Wake up, go to the computer, eat,meet my girlfriend, watch TV, go to bed. What should be changed in Germany AND AT THE World Cup? The track in germany are to slow and they should have bigger jumps. What are your goals for 2001? To ride better and maybe make top ten results.

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